I was typing papers for new school students when Mama called. We talked about some senseless things for a while before she finally told me about it. “Well, Donner, there’s this class up at the high school this summer.” She said. “They say they can teach me to read and write. I’m trying to decide whether.”

“Of course, you should do it! That would be so wonderful. I’d be so proud of you.” I answered. She was 63 and had survived two alcoholic husbands and was an expert at buying and selling garage sale junk to keep food on her own table and buy Christmas presents for me and my brother’s kids. She used food stamps to buy food and other goods. Mama laughed, seemingly with relief. “Well, you know, I’d about gotten used to being the silliest old lady in town,” she said.

It turned out that her neighbor had found the class for her. The young woman had been doing Mama’s “business” for a while in my absence, helping to relieve my guilt over leaving Mississippi. The friend was a little crazy, but Mama liked her. She was real and, by then, I hated pretension as much as Mama did. When I was little, she would tell me: “Remember, Donner Kay, nobody’s better than anybody else.”

Three months into the class. Mama left a message on my answering machine: “Donner, I taught a class tonight!” She was almost singing the words. “The teacher let me teach the class!” She soon wrote me a letter in a careful, boxy print I had never seen, instead of the strange way she had long written family names she had memorized.

The next time I flew home to visit, we both laughed like 12-year-olds as she read words from billboards on the way from the airport. Her grammar was getting better. She kept talking about her classes and the other students.

Almost 80 percent of primary and secondary school students had the opportunity to get more nightly sleep this semester, after education authorities took measures to reduce their academic workload, the Ministry of Education said on Wednesday.

Lyu Yugang, director of the ministry’s department of basic education, said 77.14 million parents were surveyed to make sure whether their children were getting enough sleep.

Schools and parents have also paid more attention to students’ sleep time, with 98.7 percent of schools asking parents to monitor their children’s sleep and study time.

In April, the ministry advised that primary school students should go to bed before 9:20 pm, middle school students before 10 pm and high school students before 11 pm. Students should go to bed at the recommended times, even if they have not finished their homework. Schools should control the amount of homework assigned to students to make sure primary school students can finish all their written homework at school and secondary school students can finish most of their homework on campus. Students in primary and secondary are prevented from bringing smartphones to class, the ministry said. Almost all schools no longer assign homework via smartphones and students do not need to finish their homework digitally, he added.

“Homework, after-school tutoring courses and online games should all take second place to ensure students can get enough sleep. And in fact, from our survey, many parents hold a positive attitude towards these.” Lyu said.

Zhang Xiu, mother of a primary school student in Beijing, said “Thanks to this, my daughter can sleep more than nine hours a night, as the school has reduced the amount of her homework. I believe a healthy body is more important than academic achievement.”

While tough measures have been taken to limit the amount of time young students can spend playing online games to three hours a week, the students might waste time on short video platforms and parents need to act to stop this, Lyu added.

“Listen!” Mr. Lee said seriously at the beginning of his first class, “I will put a lie into each of my classes. Your job is to try and catch me in the Lie of the Day.”

That was really a clever way to fix our attention on the dry and boring subject- geography. Then in the following weeks, we didn’t let off every single word of what he was saying in class and challenged (质疑) his lectures. When his class ended with nobody seeing through the lie, Mr. Lee would say, “Ah ha! Each of you has a lie in your notes. Discuss among yourselves what it might be, and I will tell you at the end of this term.”

Mr. Lee’s special style of teaching worked. All of us reviewed and discussed about our notes actively.

One Monday at the end of the term, Mr. Lee listened carefully to what we were questioning for almost ten minutes. Then he finally said, “Do you still remember the first lesson how I said that every lecture has a lie?”

Confused (疑惑), we said yes.

“Well, that was a real big lie. In fact, all the lectures I’ve given before are completely true. But I am glad you worked so hard. Move on.”

Hearing this, all eyes in the classroom went wide.

While my knowledge of geography has been forgotten over time, the lessons have stayed with me. “Experts” can be wrong and say things that sound right, so build a habit of evaluating (评估) new information and check it against things you already accept as a fact.